The Art & Thoughts of Justine Mara Andersen

Kayak

Went kayaking on lake Newnan with Joe today. We live on lake Newnan (for those of you who don’t know) so we launched the right off the back yard! It was pretty amazing! Eagles, osprey, herons, and lots of other wildlife. All along the shoreline there is an overgrowth of beautiful yellow flowers on all the floating islands. It’s overwhelming.

What’s more overwhelming was the dawning reminder that I am now living the very life I wanted to live. This is it. Finally, I have arrived. However long it lasts, I will enjoy it for all that it is.

Daily, I now have access to all the sorts of things that used to make up my vacations, and no less significantly, the life I daydreamed about is around me at every moment! My room, my job, Tom, Joe, my students, the lake, the forest, the fig trees, even my new auntie Joye, and so much more, and all of it what I wake to every day. I have even taken to having fresh flowers in my room, all picked from the grounds and lake.

There are still struggles, still the relentless poverty, still the lingering episodes of depression, still so much to do… but all those things were with me tenfold in akron… a place that seems to be an incubator for depression, poverty, and struggle, a suffocating cold grey place that I thank Lord Ganesha every day to be free of.

Florida, as it turns out, was far more than a daydream, it was a destiny and a home, and I am there now. And I intend to appreciate it.